La Solidaridad

Kristine Mae “Tata” Guillamas is taken cared of by sister Kristine Joy and eldest brother Karl Anthony who came all the way from Palawan to be with Tata in her last hours

Farewell, Tata
By HAZEL P. VILLA

Iloilo City, Philippines

She waited for her eldest brother to arrive so that her family would be complete, and then 12-year-old Kristine Mae “Tata” Guillamas returned home to her Creator.

Tata gave up the fight against the complications brought about by Tetralogy of Fallot (TOF), a cyanotic type of heart disease at 2:10 am of June 30 in the company of her parents and 10 siblings at their home in No. 30 Democracia St., Jaro.

Tata gave a slow goodbye, closing her eyes at 6 a.m. of June 29, after a great gasp for breath followed by body tremors that rendered her immobile. She was also running a fever of 38 degrees. Family members lay her on the bed and waited for 24-year-old Karl Anthony, the eldest Guillamas son, to arrive from Palawan .

Jocelyn, Tata’s mother, said the last body movement her eighth child made was a very slight movement of her two hands upon Karl’s arrival past 6 p.m. of June 29. Karl never left her bedside until his sister died.

This writer was with Tata four hours before she said her final goodbye -- the subject of two stories in the Inquirer (Inquirer Visayas, March 12 and May 14, 2005) chronicling her battle with TOF in the midst of grave financial problems and trials where she gave hope to her family to hold on and look towards a better future.

Tata slowly wasted away from TOF that consists of four anomalies – the most important being a hole in the wall separating the right and left ventricle, and a markedly reduced blood flow to the lungs because of an obstruction in the pulmonary valve or artery that overworked her heart, making her breathe rapidly and turn blue.

She was diagnosed with TOF when she was seven months old and needed surgical intervention to correct the ailment but the daily struggle of feeding and clothing 11 children so overwhelmed the now unemployed Guillamas couple who used to be into fish brokerage that they left everything to God’s will.

By the time Tata turned 11, it was too late to do any surgical interventions to save her life. All doctors specializing in pediatrics and cardiology that the family approached had only one prognosis: supportive therapy through medications because she runs a huge risk of dying while being operated on.

Dr. Doris Mendoza, a pediatric cardiologist here who diagnosed Tata, advised her family to “add life to her remaining years” and this was made possible through the help of Inquirer readers who donated more than P100,000 for Tata’s medicine, food and last two hospitalizations on April 1-8 and April 28 to May 5, 2005. Other readers gave groceries and toys.

“Please tell Inquirer’s readers that my heart is overflowing with gratitude for their help and prayers,” said Jocelyn who keeps in a small notebook more than 70 cell phone numbers of Inquirer readers who responded to her child’s plight.

When she could still speak, Tata asked elder sister Kristine Joy, 23, what it was like to die and her constant caretaker said, “It’s just like going to sleep.”

"Ah, amo man lang na gali. Pahuway na ko, nakapoy na gid ko (Oh, it’s just like that. I’m going to rest, I’m so tired),” said Tata who was by then sitting on the floor and propping her head with a small chair.

Days before she died, Tata had two requests: that her family members visit her grave often and that her hair should be in braids when she is laid to rest.

Tata will be sent to her final resting place at the Jaro Public Cemetery on July 23 with the family still undecided about other details as of this writing.

Great grief has overwhelmed Jocelyn but she smiled wanly when she recounted that two weeks before her daughter’s departure for the great beyond, regular-sized white and aqua blue butterflies hovered in and out of Tata’s bedroom that was surrounded with greenery.

Photo by Hazel P. Villa, PDI Visayas Bureau.

Jocelyn gently told her daughter, “They are fetching you.”